Planning Black Friday

Midday Matinee is our people watching, people doing and people being feature. Join the Woodland Creatures for an afternoon break.

Welcome back to Tuesday’s Tale, a weekly feature where we collaborate to write a story. Previous Tuesday’s Tales include Harrumph and Da Ballotz. We follow the basic rules of the “Yes, And” improvisational game – accept everything written so far as part of the story, and add your own paragraph (or so) where the last addition left off – except you needn’t begin your addition with “Yes, and.” I’ll start the story….

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“Sweetheart,” Anna said, as sweetly as a regular Coke topped with Cool Whip, “you know I like to plan holiday shopping as an event.”

“More like a military campaign,” Bob replied, as drily as a glass of Grenache Blanc topped with sawdust, “complete with grease-penciled map overlays. One year’s plan filled a three-ring binder.”

“That’s why I got this.” She held up her smartphone. “Now I’ll have our objectives, maneuver routes, and rally points at my fingertips.”

“I assume you’ll assign me to logistics again?” Bob asked

Anna shook her head and thumbed her phone. “Last year you overestimated our granola bar consumption by twenty-three percent, and underestimated our water consumption by nineteen percent. So I’ve detailed Connie to handle logistics this year.”

“Whew,” Bob said. “We’ll have plenty of ChapStik, at least.”

“I heard that, dad!” the teen called from her room.

“Odd,” Bob mused. “She can hear that, but not you asking her to do the dishes.”

“And the map,” said Anna. “You were useless last year, complaining about getting your foot run over by a shopping cart…”

“A very heavy cart,” Bob protested. “I spent six weeks in a cast!”

“Regardless, other than being a battering ram for Connie and me, you can sit it out. You never get your entire list anyway.”

Bob sighed. “Anna, just because I was a tight end in high school football, it doesn’t mean I can run people down.”

“Lower your head and charge. We’ll be right behind you. That’s all you have to do, that and answer our queries. The mall is going to take about five hours, and Connie and I need to coordinate.”

Connie entered the room, brushing her long brown hair. “Calvin is coming with me, too. His family gave him a list.”

“I hope they gave him a credit card, too,” Bob said. For all that Black Friday was supposed to be a bunch of sales, the credit cards were always smoking by the time it was over, and he was going to spend the next year bringing up his credit score again.

“I’ve assigned Calvin to Team Connie,” Anna said, bringing up her smartphone map, already dotted with blue symbols and arrows. “Ellen will be with me. You’ll take point while we maneuver to our objectives. Then you guard our rear, ready to move if we meet resistance.”

Bob looked at her warily. “What … resistance … are you expecting?”

Connie caught her mom’s nod and held up her own smartphone map, replete with red symbols. “Intel says to expect civilian interdiction at our objectives, at our rally points, and along our march routes.”

“The stores and parking lots will be crowded, in other words,” Bob said, in other words.

“And the roads,” Anna added. “That’s why we want you to coordinate with air support.”

“Have the traffic report on the car radio?” Bob asked.

“Affirmative,” Anna said.

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“And just to make things better,” Connie added, “Calvin is bringing the camera drone he got for his birthday. We can get a bird’s eye view of the clearest route to each destination inside the mall.”